Description:
Cotton whitework quilt machine woven on the jacquard loom or "quilted in the loom" in an overall line pattern spaced about 1/8" apart in a meandering floral and foliate design and decorative quilted border on four sides; silk or linen decorative fringe on four sides; bound on four sides by white cotton or linen tape; a looser, plain weave, white cotton backing with initials cross-stitched in red thread in a corner, probably added alter; and cotton batting. Both loom-quilted and hand-quilted versions of what is now referred to as whitework (white quilts with white embroidery or surface design) were widely available in American during the 18th and 19th centuries. Current scholarship suggests that the contemporary use of the the term 'marseille' referred only to quilting done on the loom, while hand-made examples were referred to as a 'white quilt' or 'white quilted counterpane.' These whitework quilts evolved out of the intricately quilted, stuffed, and embroidered bed quilts, petticoats, and waistcoats produced in France, India, and England in the 17th and 18th century. Called "marseille" after the port through which the French quilting was exported, this work was replicated by the drawloom in a technique patented in 1745. In 1763, George Glasgow and Robert Elder of Manchester, England, registered a patent "for a method of weaving and quilting in the loom, in every method, fashion and figure, as well as in imitation of the common manner of quilting of India, French and Marseille quilting." Soon after, Manchester weavers began to produce a cloth they called Marseille quilting, used in both yardage and as bedcovers, which was ordered by merchants to be used in petticoats and waistcoats as well as ready-made coverlets. This machine-woven "quilted" technique was adopted to the jacquard loom in the early 19th century, making it more efficient and cheaper to produce marseille coverlets. This example was purchased at Fulgence & Cie in Pairs.
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